Compiled Aff Answers

Non-Uq – SDTF

Last month a "Sustainable Defense Task Force" proposed cutting $1.1 trillion of a projected $7 trillion cost over a decade. How? Reduce the number of nuclear weapons in half to 1,000, saving $113 billion. Reduce conventional forces by 200,000 saving $395 billion and pare the number of ships from 287 to 230, saving $177 billion. Only a quarter favored an income tax hike of 10% to 20% to raise up to $381 billion in 2025. Half supported a 20% jump for the rich, yielding $174 billion, and two-thirds back an extra 5% for those earning over $1 million. That would pull in $34 billion with another $20 billion by raising capital gains - if these folk don't move to the Bahamas. Nearly half supported limiting itemized deductions to 28% of income, though couples earning over $210,000 deduct 33% to 35%. Half support reforming the entire tax code, to reduce rates and earmark 10% to 30% for deficit reduction. To summarize, half of participants agreed on how to cut $1.2 trillion; another 18% agreed on paring $1 trillion. "You have restored my confidence in the ability of citizens to challenge the politicians," said Alice Rivlin, Co-Chair of a Bi-partisan Debt Reduction Task Force.

Non-Uq – Savings Inevitable

While Gates and Obama won that Titanic F-22 fight last year, they waffled on the C-17 and let 18 more be produced. This year, Gates says he means it on the C-17, but the C-17 porkers are laying in wait for him in the Senate where they have the votes, and the House C-17 porkers lust to tag along. More problematic is Gates' selection of the second F-35 engine to take a stand on. In 2009, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) repeated a previous internal DOD study saying the second engine, bought competitively, could save money. Nonetheless, Gates -- now with Obama belatedly backing him -- says he'll get the bill vetoed if it endorses any competition between F-35 engines. Gates' $102 billion reduction in overhead is a cumulative goal for five years, not one, and the bigger savings don't arrive until the elusive (may-never-happen) out-years. This will be after Gates, maybe even Obama, is long gone. The first year savings ($7 billion) is a puny 1.2 percent of the 2012 Pentagon spending plan. The public schedule includes no savings in the next fiscal year, the one for 2011 that doesn't even start until next October. According to an internal Defense Business Board study, DOD spends 40 percent of its funds on overhead. If the whole $102 billion is saved, and if it all comes out of overhead (which is not the plan), DOD spending for bureaucratic fat will be reduced only 8.5 percent. The administrative bloat would go down, but only from 40 percent to 37 percent of total DOD spending. Similar timidity and procrastination is recommended by the Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Congressman Ike Skelton, D-MO. Having finished shepherding the 2011 DOD authorization bill through the House of Representatives last month, Skelton now announces that next year will he look at saving money. The only sum he would identify is "X amount." Expect little to nothing from this diffidence, and you will not be disappointed. Others are less timid. Congressman Barney Frank, D-MA, has put together an alternative DOD budget plan to reduce spending there by $1 trillion over ten years. He has logic on his side: since 2000, the Pentagon's "base" budget has gone up by the same amount ($1 trillion), in addition to the $1 Trillion also spent on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.